The Time Meddler (TV story)
The Time Meddler 'is the ninth and final serial of the second season of ''Doctor Who. It was written by Dennis Spooner, directed by Douglas Camfield and featured William Hartnell as the First Doctor, Maureen O'Brien as Vicki Pallister and Peter Purves as Steven Taylor. Overview To be added Synopsis The TARDIS lands on the Northumbrian coast, where new companion Steven discovers a Viking helmet and the Doctor deduces that they must have arrived in the 11th century. Steven remains skeptical, especially when he and Vicki encounter a what appears to be a Saxon hunter with a modern wristwatch. Investigating a nearby monastery, the Doctor discovers further anachronisms. Who is the mysterious monk observing the time travellers' every move and why is he so interested in the outcome for the Battle of Hastings? Plot The Watcher (1) In the TARDIS control room, the Doctor, still upset over the departure of Ian and Barbara, pilots the ship to it's next location. He talks with Vicki to make certain that she didn't want to return to their time with them. They hear a clatter from the other room and ready themselves for whatever comes out. Hiding behind the door, expecting a Dalek, they are startled when a completely disoriented Steven Taylor emerges and collapses on the floor. The TARDIS then lands on a shore beneath a cliff, it's arrival having been observed by a mysterious Monk. Inside, Steven wakes and is quite impressed by the TARDIS, though the Doctor is still slightly irked. Steven is highly skeptical by the TARDIS being bigger on the inside, let alone a time machine. The Doctor and Vicki both scoff at his disbelief and prepare to step outside. On the land above the cliff face, one of the locals, comes to inform his leader that something has landed on the beach. Outside the TARDIS, Vicki finds a Viking helmet, confirming the date and place for the Doctor as 11th Century England. The discovery does nothing to assuage Steven's incredulity about time travel, but while they talk about the ship, their discussion is overheard the Monk, who takes a keen interest in it. After the travellers go off to explore, the Monk comes out of hiding and examines the TARDIS, taking great delight from it's presence. As it gets dark, the Doctor makes his way to a cottage in the nearby wood; looking around, he is caught by it's inhabitants. The Monk, meanwhile, makes his way to a nearby monastery. The two men from the house look over the cliff where the TARDIS was and discover it to have been swallowed by the waves. The woman, back at the cabin, gives the Doctor a drink and apologises for her interactions earlier. From their discussion, the Doctor discerns his relative location as Northumbria, 1066, shortly before history placed the Battle of Hastings. The singing he hears from the monastery starts to warp and falter like a recording and the Doctor goes to investigate. Elsewhere, Vicki and Steven meet one of the men from the cliff, when Steven wrestles with him over something he finds. After the man rushes off, Steven presents Vicki with what he'd found, a 20th century wristwatch. Walking to the monastery, the Monk discreetly lets the Doctor inside and he discovers the singing to be emanating from a gramophone hidden behind a curtain. He switches it off, but as he turns to leave, makeshift cell bars drop in front of him and the Monk presents himself, laughing. The Meddling Monk (2) The Monk makes the Doctor some slices of toast with an anachronistic toaster and griddle; he brings it to him through his cell door, but the Doctor refuses it and throws liquid in his face. The locals make their way through the forest and observe Vicki sleeping close by. She's woken by Steven who went to get food, and they are overheard by the locals. Alerted to their presence, Steven is apprehended and Vicki is held at knifepoint. The Monk leaves the monastery and looks out over the cliff, when the woman from the house and another approach him with food. When they leave, the Monk looks over the horizon again and spots a Viking longboat in the distance. While being taken to a nearby Saxon village, the men, Wulnoth and Eldred fight over what to do with Vicki and Steven. When Eldred raises arms against them, Wulnoth's wife Edith, the woman who aided the Doctor, arrives and defuses the situation. She and Wulnoth give Vicki and Steven provisions for their journey and send them in the direction the Doctor went. Back at the monastery, the Monk hurries back inside the crypt while Viking soldiers climb their way to the top of the cliffs. The leader tells three others, Sven, Ulf and Gunnar to go and raid the nearby village. Vicki and Steven arrive at the monastery, where they are met by the Monk; when they ask after the Doctor, he lies and claims nobody came in the last few days. Steven is immediately suspicious of the Monk, not believing his claims and opts to try something when he comes out. When the Monk comes out again, Steven gets him to describe the Doctor, having not given a description, and give himself away, though Vicki is unsure as to whether his giving himself away was intentional or not. Nevertheless, they go and look for a way in. That night, Edith is awakened by a motion outside and, arming herself with a spear, goes out to investigate, when she is jumped by the Vikings. Wulnoth returns to find the house raided and Edith badly injured. Eldred is convinced that Vicki and Steven were responsible but Edith disproves this when she awakes. Wulnoth arms himself and takes an army to find and kill them. As the Vikings make their way back, the villagers attack them and a battle ensues, which ends in Gunnar being killed and Eldred injured. Wulnoth takes him to the monastery. Steven and Vicki sneak inside the monastery under the Monk's notice and head off in search of the Doctor. The Monk restarts the gramophone to draw suspicion away and resets his trap. Vicki and Steven search through the hallways, unaware that the Monk is watching them, but he is forced to meet Wulnoth and Eldred as the door. Vicki and Steven find the gramophone before wandering into the Doctor's cell; they don't find the Doctor, however, just a pile of skins. A Battle of Wits (3) The Monk leads Wulnoth and Eldred to a resting place while he goes to check for Vicki and Steven, who are pondering how the Doctor managed to get out. They look around for a way out and find a secret passageway behind a stone wall. The Monk arrives in the cell to find it empty, wondering himself how the Doctor manages to get out. In the passageway, Steven and Vicki make their way to it's end to get out. In Wulnoth's house, the Doctor manages to return to the village where Edith tells him about the Viking attack and that her husband and other townsfolk have gone to hunt them. As he leaves, the Doctor mutters off the established course of history to a baffled Edith. Coming out the end of the passageway, Steven and Vicki find no sign of the Doctor; reasoning the anachronisms are the Monk's doing, Steven wishes to return to the monastery, but Vicki convinces him to return to the TARDIS and wait for the Doctor. Meanwhile, the Monk prescribes some penicillin to some Eldred and asks him how long the rest of the Vikings would take to the arrive. Wulnoth isists that Eldred stay where he is on account of his injury, to which the Monk is forced to reluctantly agree. The surviving Viking soldiers, Sven and Elf decide to pretend to request sanctuary at the monastery and then take hostages. In the crypt, the Monk monitors the progress of events leading up to the Battle of Hastings, which include steps detailing unrecorded events. The Doctor lures the Monk outside bluffs him back in to answer his questions. Arriving back at the cliffs, Vicki and Steven are shocked to find the tide having come in, cutting off their access to the TARDIS. Steven decides to head back to the monastery and finds an automatic turret concealed in the bushes. The Doctor interrogates the Monk but they are interrupted by knocking on the door; forcing the Monk to disguise him, the Doctor opens the doors to the Vikings, who take him hostage as a bargaining chip to the other monks and lock him in his original cell while the Monk slips away. Elf makes his way down to the crypt, where he is knocked unconscious by the Monk. Come the morning, Vicki and Steven head up the passageway into the monastery again. Inside, the Doctor opens the passageway entrance to lure Sven inside and then knocks him out and escapes. The Monk heads down to the village when he speaks to Edith and Wulnoth and asks them to light beacon fires on the cliff tops, claiming that they're signalling building materials and they comply. However, Wulnoth, upon hearing of what the Doctor said to Edith, starts to suspect that he's luring the Vikings there. The Monk returns to a tied-up Elf to gloat when the Doctor holds him down with a sword. In the crypt, Vicki and Steven find a live cable coming out of a sarcophagus. Following it inside, they are stunned to discover what the sarcophagus really is - a TARDIS. Checkmate (4) The Doctor continues to interrogate the Monk who explains his plan to signal the Vikings there so he can destroy them. Vicki and Steven wander around the Monk's TARDIS, discovering a mass of priceless artefacts from all over history. Steven finds some nuclear shells intended for the gun on the cliff and Vicki finds a journal of the Monk's exploits. They and the Doctor separately realise the Monk is a time meddler and is intending to alter the outcome of the Battle of Hastings by destroying the Vikings, therefore meaning William the Conqueror needn't fight the Vikings before marching to Hastings. The Doctor is disgusted by this flippant disregard for the course of history and forces the Monk to take him to his TARDIS. Meanwhile, Eldrad spots Sven walking around the monastery and starts to get suspicious; he sneaks out of the monastery and heads back to the village. Arriving in the Monk's TARDIS, they find Steven and Vicki already inside. He gets Steven to keep an eye on the Monk while the Doctor assures Vicki that the TARDIS is fine, in spite of the tide. The Doctor admires the Monk's TARDIS but is still aggravated by the Monk and his cavalier attitude to his feckless alteration of history to try an meet his idea of improvement. The Monk rushes from his TARDIS and caught by the Vikings, but he draws their attention to the Doctor and his companions. In the village, Wulnoth and Edith convince the people that the Monk is a Viking spy, which is further helped by Eldred's arrival and he tells them that Vikings are in the monastery. While the Monk gives the Vikings technology to guide them in, the Doctor, Vicki and Steven are tied up in the crypt, while the Doctor tries to fathom a way to free them and stop the Monk from altering history. As the Vikings take the Monk's device outside, the villagers arrive and swarm the monastery, chasing away the Monk, Sven and Elf while Edith releases the Doctor, Vicki and Steven. The villagers chase the Monk, Sven and Elf through the forest; the Monk misdirect the Vikings and the villagers catch and kill them while he escapes. In the Monk's TARDIS, the Doctor disconnects a component from the console and ties it to a piece of string. Leaving the ship with the string attached, he pulls the component free from outside and is overjoyed at his ingenuity and leaves a note for the Monk before they leave for the TARDIS. Later that evening, they make it back to the cliff and spot the TARDIS on the shore, safe and sound and head down to it. The Monk makes it back to the monastery to hide from the fight outside and finds the Doctor's note for him on his TARDIS. Reading it, the Doctor claims that one day, once the Monk has learned his lesson about meddling with history, he would return and 'release him'. The Monk just laughs this off and prepares to depart, only to find the Doctor had taken his dimensional control and the interior has shrunk to proportionate size, rendering it useless and stranding him in 1066. The Doctor's TARDIS then takes off from the beach and the story concludes with silhouetted images of Steven, Vicki and the Doctor superimposed over an image of a galaxy. Cast * Dr. Who - William Hartnell * Vicki - Maureen O'Brien * Steven - Peter Purves * Monk - Peter Butterworth * Edith - Alethea Charlton * Eldred - Peter Russell * Wulnoth - Michael Miller * Saxon Hunter - Michael Guest * Ulf - Norman Hartley * Viking Leader - Geoffrey Cheshire * Sven - David Anderson * Gunnar the Giant - Ronald Rich Crew * Writer - Dennis Spooner * Title Music - Ron Grainer and the BBC Radiophonic Workshop * Story Editor - Donald Tosh * Designer - Barry Newbury * Producer - Verity Lambert * Director - Douglas Camfield * Fight Arranger - David Anderson * Percussion - Charles Botterill * Costumes - Daphne Dare * Make-up - Sonia Markham and Monica Ludkin * Lighting - Ralph Walton * Sound - Ray Angel and Brian Hiles * Assistant Floor Manager - Gillian Chardet * Production Assistant - David Maloney * Special Sounds - Brian Hodgson * Theme Arrangement - Delia Derbyshire * Title Music - Ron Grainer References To be added Story notes To be added Broadcast & Ratings Continuity To be added Home video and audio releases To be added External Links * Official ''The Time Meddler'' page on '''Doctor Who Website